The 2nd Annual NY Autism/Asperger's Conference

If you're near New York City, we hope you'll plan to attend the 2nd Annual Autism/Asperger's Conference "Educating and Healing Children" on Saturday October 3 and Sunday, October 4 at the Stephen Gaynor School. On Saturday at 4:30pm, join David Kirby, Dan Olmsted, Stephen Shore, Barbara Fischkin and Kim Stagliano for a Writer's Panel. We'd love to meet you! 

Full conference details are HERE.

Featured speakers include Eustacia Cutler, the mother of Temple Grandin and the author of “A Thorn in My Pocket” which describes the challenges raising a child with autism. And DAN! physician Dr. Nancy O'Hara. 

Other Conference Highlights:

•Nutritional Problems in Children with Autism: Assessment and Treatment –
James Adams, Ph.D.

•A "Best Practices" Model of Behavioral Treatment for Autism –
Doreen Granpeesheh, Ph.D., BCBA

•Teaching Yoga Skills to Young Children with Developmental Delays –
Deborah Gruber, M.Ed., Ph.D.

Co-sponsors include The NAA New York Chapter and The Autism Research Institute.

The treatment category is sponsored by Lee Silsby, the leader in quality compounded medications for autism.

Comments

[Benedetta Stilwell]

Sally Troxell
I am perhaps the less qualified here to answer. BUT I for years have never been a fan of mercury in the vaccines being the cause of the rise in autism.
I witnessed my children react to their DPT vaccines but nothing else, no other vaccines, so I assumed it was an allergic reaciton to the toxin of the pertussis vaccine! That was in the 80's
Then I found out that DPT had the mecury in it while the first MMRs did not. They changed that in the 90's (my understanding). But still did they not get that stuff out of vaccines after all the congression hearings in 2003?

Then Tom Insel head of a committee for IACC an organization within the NIH that is in control of the research money for autism spoke during a congressional hearing that I listened to. He was refussing any more research money for a vaccine - autism link. He said that the anitgens (protein parts of the actual pahtogen) have gone down and refined even while autism has gone up.

Since I witnessed my children's reactions then I had to rethink some things.

If the antigens have gone down then they have had to up on the adjuvents (stuff added to the antigens to get the immune system to react more to the antigens)like aluminum, sequelene, and mecury. It may not be just mercury alone but the other stuff.

Not only that but it appears that mercury has not been taken out of the vaccines. Lying in America is something that is just beyond us! A big company in front of eveybody is just not done! But that is about what is going on. I am sure there are more people on this blog much more knowledge than me on this. But it appears that when you go in to get a vaccine or even on the news they say "oh no' no mercury" and then "oh well, yes there is". Mercuy is still in the tetanus shots and still in the flu shots, mercury is still in all the multivial stuff.

[Sally Troxell]

I just received a newsletter from The Vitamin D Council http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/) regarding a recently-released paper on autism, from Dennis Kinney & colleagues of Harvard, with which you're likely familiar. The Vitamin D Council's many epidemiological studies demonstrate many possible conditions which may well relate to Vitamin D deficiency, including autism, a position I share. But the Council appears to believe Vit D deficiency is the CAUSE (of course): "All in all, I liked Dr. Kinney and colleagues’ paper; I hope Dr. Kinney can wake someone up at Autism Speaks, which funds Dr. Kinney. (If Autism Speaks doesn’t hurry and help fund the Vitamin D Council, they won’t be able to get any credit at all for helping discover the cause of autism.) The authors also listed evidence that strengthens the Vitamin D theory of autism, evidence I discussed in the original paper."

But Dr. Cannell also states: "My problem with the paper is the same problem I have with any of the air and water pollution autism theories, why now? Certainly, if a toxin was causing autism, evidence exists that exposure to that toxin has increased part and parcel with the epidemic of autism.

For awhile, that was one of the strongest arguments for the mercury in vaccines theory; administration of more and more mercury-containing vaccines paralleled the increase in autism. The problem with the vaccine theory is that when they took the mercury out of vaccines, the incidence of autism went up, not down."

Since I am a "lurker" on your good A of A site and have not thoroughly read the body of work, I have missed your information / explanations to the commonly held view "...when they took the mercury out of vaccines, the incidence of autism went up, not down."

Could you or someone else address this issue?

Many thanks to you for your important work.